Pursuant to a court directive, the Delhi Police Crime Branch on Sunday registered a First Information Report against Team Anna member and retired Indian Police Service officer, Kiran Bedi, on charges of alleged cheating and criminal breach of trust committed over a period of time.
The case has been registered under Sections 420 (cheating), 406 (criminal breach of trust) and 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code, following the court order on a complaint lodged by advocate Devinder Singh Chauhan.
Time will tell : Bedi
For her part, Ms. Bedi said: “Having been a cop, I have sound evidence and endurance to deal with this FIR. Time will tell!” She said once the probe begins, she would present the evidence to the investigating officer that would demolish all the charges. “For me now nothing is a surprise. It only strengthens my resolve to do more,” she had said on Twitter on Saturday.
According to the complainant, Ms. Bedi's trusts — India Vision Foundation and Navjyoti Foundation — had received donations for providing free computer training to the families and children of police personnel, apart from distributing computers to poor children for free.
“Instead of imparting free training or distributing free computers, Kiran Bedi, in collusion with some unknown persons, cheated Vedanta Foundation and made a plan to cheat the kids of cops and various paramilitary forces and for the purpose she planned to collect Rs. 20,000 per month per training centre. For siphoning money for herself, Kiran Bedi entered into a donation agreement with Vedanta according to which Rs.6,000 out of the total amount of Rs.20,000 was to be paid by Vedanta to her two trusts, on the false ground that Kiran Bedi had arranged for the land and electricity for the said centre [training centre] for running their activities,” said the complaint.
Mr. Chauhan alleged that the land and electricity was arranged by the police organisation and not by Ms. Bedi. “Neither Ms. Bedi nor any of her associates disclosed the fact to Vedanta that they are illegally charging Rs.6,000 for each centre for the expenses [of] rent of the building and charges of electricity.”
The complainant, while mentioning the inflation of air fare bills by Ms. Bedi, also demanded an Enforcement Directorate probe into the donations received by her two trusts from abroad. Adding another charge, he alleged that during her tenure as Principal of Police Training College, Ms. Bedi had ordered purchase of computers at a highly inflated price of Rs.50,000 ,whereas their actual price was only Rs.20,000.
